“You will be the same person in five years as you are today except for the people you meet and the books you read”

How many new people have you got to know today?

Well… me neither.

Since most of us don’t meet a lot of new people every day it leaves us with reading.

There is probably a lot of books you have read during your life but I can guarantee that there are even more that you haven’t.

I took a look at the books I had beside my bed and came to the conclusion that I have completely read just a few of them versus most I have only read bits and pieces or even nothing.

I am changing this.

From now on I am going to spend 30 minutes to 1 hour reading every day.

Think about this for a second:

An average person reads about 30 pages per hour. Reading for 1 hour every day for a single year means that you would read 10 950 pages. The average book being about 200 pages makes it almost 55 books a year.

Will reading 55 books on your specialty give you an edge?

What do you think – if you were to read 55 books in any given field would it give you a small edge against all the people who are not doing any reading?
Just to get the facts straight – 95% of the people in the world are not regular readers (That probably covers most of your colleagues as well).

Well, that’s why as of today I am reading at least 30 minutes every single day.

And here is what I did to motivate myself:

I suggest everyone do the same – divide your books into 2 piles (read and not read) and start reading!

As you keep up with your reading schedule the pile with unread books will decrease and the one with read books will start to grow!

Another good way to keep your book readings in speed is to get them from library. Then you automatically have the “deadline” when you should be done reading it and return it. If the book is worth reading you probably find the time to do so
Another bonus is that it keeps your home nicely uncluttered.

You forgot that the pile of unread books should/will continue to grow as well. Eventually you won’t have enough floor space, perhaps you should get a few bookshelves I like the idea with the sign/labels though (and you could do that with shelves too)

Great idea! Just got to find room for the stacks! There’s no doubt that leaders are readers. So many stop educating themselves after their “formal education” is over and in the process they stop growing.